Tesla and Mozilla Among Businesses That Paused Facebook
Mozilla, Tesla and other companies are temporarily taking distances from Facebook following revelations of the major leak of user data to political consultants associated with the 2016 Trump campaign.
"We're taking a break from Facebook," Mozilla said in a blog post on Wednesday. The company, which created the Firefox web browser, said it is "pressing pause" on its Facebook advertising and won't be posting on its Facebook page. But it did not delete its page and said it will consider returning if Facebook takes stronger actions to protect users' data and improves privacy settings.
German bank Commerzbank also said it was putting Facebook advertising "on hold" as it evaluates data security. Sonos said it is pulling advertising from Facebook, Instagram, Google, and Twitter for a week.
"The Cambridge Analytica scandal, like many recent headlines coming out of Silicon Valley, raises questions about whether Big Tech is doing enough to balance its own interests with one of its biggest responsibilities: safeguarding your privacy," Sonos wrote in a blog post.
Elon Musk said in a Twitter exchange that he would take down the Facebook sites for his companies Tesla and SpaceX. As of Thursday afternoon, the sites appeared to be inactive.
While these symbolic actions are likely temporary since it is obvious that Facebook's platform is not something even big companies can afford to neglect, they're one more piece of the growing headache for Facebook since news of the leak broke a week ago. The fact is that most advertisers need Facebook as a platform because its reach is tremendous.
Facebook faces lawsuits
Meanwhile, Facebook is facing at least six lawsuits related to the Cambridge Analytic scandal. Along with a class action suit filed earlier this week on behalf of Facebook users whose data was obtained by Cambridge Analytica, three shareholders have also filed their own complaints.
Facebook has been also hit with inquiries from Congress and the UK Parliament. It's also being investigated by the states of New York and Massachusetts and reportedly the FTC.
British regulators on Friday began searching the London offices of Cambridge Analytica, shortly after a judge approved a search warrant.
Around 18 enforcement agents from the office of Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham entered the company's London headquarters at around 8pm to execute the warrant.
Britain's High Court granted the raid request less than an hour earlier, as Denham investigates claims that Cambridge Analytica may have illegally harvested Facebook data for political ends.